Queen of Love and Beauty
by Charmtion
Summary: "I present you as Queen of Love and Beauty, lest the crowd be as in awe of your beauty as I am."


As the prince mounts his grey palfrey all eyes simmer on him, not least the wide blue eyes of Lyanna Stark, who at last rises from her daydreams to look upon this man, the man she's come all this way to watch. Over a thousand leagues travelled from Winterfell, just to see her brother Brandon fight the Prince of Dragonstone. Squinting, she peers across the stands and struggles to see him clearly through the dust rising off the beaten ground. Just a tall man, he appears to be, clad in shimmering black armour, bright as obsidian, and on his chest a three-headed dragon, red, studied with rubies, bright as the sun, dark as dried blood. His helm is on, she can not see so much as a glint of his eyes as he takes his lance from the squire and charges in a sudden fit of noise and flurry toward her brother. When did Brandon mount? She frowns. _So lost in your own world_, Eddard always says,_ that you miss anything, yet see almost everything_. Her frown deepens; she never knows what he means when he says that. The clash of wood on clanging armour jolts her from her reveries and she slaps herself mentally for missing the first contact.

"Sometimes I wonder if you're still at Winterfell, Lyanna," murmurs Eddard from beside her, his smile easy and white. "More oft than not you seem far away, in your own world entirely. Try to pay attention."

"As my lord commands," says Lyanna, her tone perfectly polite, her head bowed, but her eyes gleaming with wicked humour.

She turns just in time to see Brandon Stark coming at Prince Rhaegar furiously. Her brother's black stallion is almost flat to the ground with the speed of his gallop, and the lance is strong and hurtling faster than an eagle to its prey. Her heart sinks as the prince nears, and from somewhere deep within her she wills her brother to miss, to miss and to fall, to shame himself and lose, just so the prince will walk unscathed. And the gods hear her plea. Rhaegar lowers his lance perfectly, and knocks Brandon neatly off the black courser with a powerful thrust. Her brother hangs for a moment in the saddle before landing heavily with a smash of metal and a fistful of curses.

"Brandon!" her voice cries before she can stop it. She looks about her, only to realise she has risen and stands alone on her feet amongst the silks and dyed velvets of the rich nobles, of the lords from houses as old and great as hers. A lone figure, small but perfectly formed, beautiful, so beautiful, in her white silken gown and her free-flowing black hair. Her blue eyes are wider than before, and a pleasant flush creeps over the creamy skin of her cheeks. Her gaze is downcast, and then it lifts, suddenly, abruptly to meet with the eyes of the black-armoured prince who has thrown off his helm. Her lips part to breathe sharply.

He has an inhuman beauty to his face, it is perfect, brow and eyes and nose and cheek and chin and lips aligned perfectly, his skin darker than his father's, yet more beautiful. His eyes are lilac, bursting like flowers in the glare of the dusky sun, and further bright in contrast to the silver-gold hair that frames his face and falls in soft artless waves to his shoulders. The Prince of Dragonstone, Rhaegar himself, heir of the Iron Throne, and more beautiful than anyone on earth.

Lyanna sits down again slowly, her white skirts spilling like fresh-drawn snow. Her eyes lower once more, aware of the crowd's prickly gaze on her, and her hands smooth the soft-spun sleeves of her gown. A deathly hush has fallen, and it is with a mixture of dread and delight that she listens to the thud of a palfrey's hooves as the prince draws near. _He is to crown the Queen of Love and Beauty_, she remembers suddenly, _to his wife, Princess Elia of Dorne_. But he rides past her, past the still figure of his queen, his lady-wife. No. Now he rides to _her_. _To me_. Her breath stops.

"Lady Stark," he murmurs, as he halts before her. With only the gentlest rise of his voice, he bids her gaze to return to him. Lilac eyes drink in blue. "I present you as Queen of Love and Beauty, lest the crowd be as in awe of your beauty as I am." With that, he lays a crown of winter roses in her lap, turns his horse and moves off.

The roses are ice-white, and ice-cold, yet somehow, as she raises them to her nose, they smell of earth and fire, of spice and flame, of him.


End file.
